Friday, May 09, 2014

Two murder trials?

There are Iraq related legal developments today. First, Iraq War veteran Matt Maupin who was captured April 9, 2004. In a briefs roundup, March 30th, 2008, in a briefs round up of various news, the Washington Post noted:

The
father of a soldier listed as missing-captured in Iraq since 2004 says
the military has informed him that his son's remains were found in Iraq.Keith
Maupin said that an Army general told him Sunday that DNA was used to
identify the remains of his son, Sgt. Keith Matthew Maupin, who went by
"Matt."Matt Maupin was a 20-year-old private first class when he was
captured April 9, 2004, after his fuel convoy was ambushed west of
Baghdad. Arabic television network al-Jazeera aired a videotape a week
later showing Maupin sitting on the floor surrounded by five masked men
holding automatic rifles.

Today, Amanda Lee Myers (AP) reports that a trial date has been set in Iraq for next Tuesday for an Iraqi whom Lt Col Alayne Conway states has "confessed to killing Maupin." An unnamed Iraqi judge states the confession took place in 2009 and led to a conviction and sentence of death; however, the conviction's set aside or reversed as a result of some paperwork issue resulting in the need for a new trial.

Turning to the issue of violence, Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reported
Sunday that a Baghdad shooting (by private contractors) killed 9 Iraqi
civilians and left fifteen more wounded. Later on Sunday, CNN reported,
"In the Baghdad gun battle, which was between security forces and
unidentified gunmen, eight people were killed and 14 wounded, most of
them civilians, an Interior Ministry official said. Details were
sketchy, but the official said witnesses told police that the security
forces involved appeared to be Westerners driving sport utility
vehicles, which are usually used by Western companies. The clash
occurred near Nisoor square, in western Baghdad. CBS and AP report that
Abdul-Karim Khalaf, spokesperson for the Interior Ministry, announced
"it was pulling the license of an American security firm allegedly
involved in the fatal shooting of civilians during an attack on a U.S.
State Department motorcade in Baghdad," that "it would prosecute any
foreign contractors found to have used excessive force" in the slaughter
(eight dead, 13 wounded) and they "have canceled the liscense of
Blcakwater and prevented them from working all over Iraqi territory."

No one's come to justice thus far as the result of deals the State Dept made with Blackwater. They basically offered immunity for information -- why they'd do something like that, why anyone would? To prevent anyone from being prosecuted.

This goes to who Blackwater was 'protecting' -- a detail the US government has never seen fit to provide to the public.

And if we're talking guilt and healing, it's really shameful that a member or members or the US government were present and have never issued a public statement expressing remorse over the deaths of Iraqis in this incident.

Aruna Viswanatha and Peter Galloway (Reuters) report that Nicholas Slatten has been indicated by a federal grand jury in the shooting. Here's the thing if the US government wants to actually do something, they need to go forward with a trial that doesn't use the statements of Slatten or 3 other contractors.

I don't know why you need the statements.

It doesn't matter whether the State Dept could legally grant immunity or not. That's a non-issue and it needs to be let go.

Four people were offered immunity and made statements based on that offer.

Those statements need to be set aside and not dealt with in any case.

It's not complicated.

'Oh, there are confessions, we must use them!' No. And we don't ever, on the left, argue such a ridiculous claim. We're fully aware of the fruit of the poison tree.

What's the key to this case?

For one thing, US officials' embarrassment.

There's no reason to keep hidden who was traveling with Blackwater that day.

It's not a national secret.

And when you get that name or names, you then have a witness or witnesses who can take to the stand.

Who can be cross-examined.

I don't know why you'd have any problems pursuing the case that way.

Investigators (government investigators who conducted the initial investigations) can also testify provided everyone agrees that the four statements made by the four suspects under the offer of immunity are set aside and not used in the case.

Regardless of the outcome of a trial and what a jury might determine, Iraqis are dead from this incident and the notion that the American public and the Iraqi public don't have a right to know whom Blackwater was allegedly protecting is laughable. This should have been made public long ago and this person or these people need to testify in public in open court about what happened -- that's the least they can do -- and they only do very little clearly since they've never felt the need to issue a statement noting their regret that Iraqis died that day.

While this 7-year-old assault continues to get large attention, Nouri al-Maliki's four months of killing civilians in Falluja in what is collective punishment (a legally defined War Crime) gets far less attention. Mohammed Tawfeeq (CNN) notes the assault today increased as Nouri attempts to 'retake' Falluja (when was Nouri ever in charge of Falluja?). Tawfeeq notes, "About 700,000 people live in Falluja, a Sunni city in Anbar province
west of Baghdad. More than 300 people, most of whom are civilians, have
been killed in Falluja since the beginning of the year." NINA notes the military's shelling of residential neighborhoods today left 7 civilians dead and thirteen more injured.

About Me

We do not open attachments. Stop e-mailing them. Threats and abusive e-mail are not covered by any privacy rule. This isn't to the reporters at a certain paper (keep 'em coming, they are funny). This is for the likes of failed comics who think they can threaten via e-mails and then whine, "E-mails are supposed to be private." E-mail threats will be turned over to the FBI and they will be noted here with the names and anything I feel like quoting.
This also applies to anyone writing to complain about a friend of mine. That's not why the public account exists.